I wake up with the sun in my face. I check my phone and see it's 9am on a Sunday. Today I go back to the academy and my dad goes back home. I get up out of the room I'm staying at in dad's hotel suite and find him eating breakfast in the balcony.
"Good morning." I say as I approach him.
"Good morning, here take a seat so you can eat some breakfast." He says serving pancakes on my plate.
"Thank you." I say as i start eating.
"Honey," my dad days before clearing his throat. "There's something I want to talk to you about."
"About what?" I ask and I see my dad putting his thoughts together.
"About your mum." He says and I stop to look at him. He can't be serious.
"I don't want to talk about that."
"Kenny, it's important that you kno-"
"All I need to know, I already do. She left us, so there's really nothing else i want to know." For 18 years I wondered about my mum and dad never wanted to talk about her, and now he is the one bringing the topic up. Why?
"Kendra I understand your upset at your mum, I really do, but she's not a bad person she jus-"
"Why are you defending her? She left you too. You expect me to believe she is not a bad person when she's out there living life not caring about her daughter? I'm sure a good person wouldn't do that."
"People make mistakes honey, we were young and naive. We didn't know any better."
"I already know this and it changes nothing. She left us; end of story. I don't want to talk about her anymore please dad, today is your last day here and I don't want her to ruin it." I say.
"Ok, ok, if you don't want to talk about I won't insist. I guess in part its my fault for not wanting to talk about her before."
"Dad."
"Ok sorry. So what do you want to do before taking you back to the academy?"
"Umm maybe go shopping, my friend's sister is getting married and I have nothing to wear."
"I'm happy to see you made friends and feel happy here."
"I am, everyday I spend here I realize this was the best decision I could've made." I say smiling and it's true. Being away, making new friends and memories has helped me cope with the pain and emptiness I was feeling when I got here.
"Honey, what really happened with Tom?" My dad asks and I freeze. I never actually told him what happened, and I still don't want to tell him. He would go be so upset.
"We broke up."
"I know but why?"
What do I tell him now? "Just things weren't working out for us anymore."
"What do you mean? You loved him very much i don't understand wha-."
"Yeah i did," I cut him off. "But I'm over it, just like you loved mum and still got over her. Im going to get ready so we can go." I say getting up and my dad nods.
I feel a knot in my stomach as I walk away. I hated the way I talked to my dad, he is the only family I have and I love him to death, but the topics he wants to talk about hurt a little.
A few minutes later we are ready to go. Roque drove us to the Yorkdale Shopping Centre. I hadn't been to the mall here and this place was nice. My dad and I had spent the weekend doing multiple activities and visiting multiple places around the city. We visited museums like the Art Gallery of Ontario and took a one day trip to the Niagara Falls, a beautiful place. I even accompanied him to a hokey game where I got to see a different side of my dad. He was no longer the serious business man-overprotective father, he was more like an energetic athletic man cheering for the players as if they were his friends. The weekend had been awesome with him, but now that the time is up and i have to go back to the academy, he wanted to take me to do something I enjoyed which was shopping.
A few hours and bags later, Roque drove us back to the academy. My dad walks me to the entrance of the building even though I insisted it wasn't necessary.
"I'm going to miss you so much." He says we hug.
"Me too dad." I say trying my hardest to not cry. "Here your coat." I say giving him coat he had giving me earlier at the mall since it was a bit cold.
"I will come back soon to visit you honey, I promise."
"I'm holding you tight on to that promise." I say and he laughs. "I love you dad."
"I love you Kenny." He says and hugs me again. We hug for a few minutes before I grab my bags and go inside. I look back one more time to wave bye to my dad who is still standing outside of the building. I quickly make my way to my room and as I walk in I'm met by Nyla who is laying on her bed reading her book.
Nyla might not have many friends, nor a special someone, but she always has a book with her.
"Kendra! Hi." She says exited as I enter.
"Hi" I greet her back.
"You have been gone for days I was starting to miss you." She says and I laugh.
"I missed you too and that's why I got you a present."
"What? You're kidding right?" She says smiling and gets up from her bed.
"Nope." I say and start looking through the bags. "I got you something for your sisters wedding."
"You're so cute Kendra you shouldn't have bothered." She says walking up to me.
I look through all my bags and I can't find the box with her gift. "I don't understand it should be here somewhere." I say trying to remember in which bag I put it.
"Maybe another bag you forgot somewhere?" Nyla says trying to brainstorm with me.
"No they didn't give me a bag, it's a small box with a necklace that would look so good with the dress you're wearing for your sister's wedding." I say and she smiles. "Wait, my dad's coat." I say remembering where I had put it. "I left it in my dad's coat pocket." I face palm myself. "Ok I'm going to run downstairs hopefully they aren't far and he can come back. I'll be back." I say before I ran out of the room ignoring Nyla telling me it was okay.
I get downstairs and run to the main patio, just to find Roque still here parked. I approach him and knock the window.
"Roque why are you still here? Where's my dad?"
"He said he had to talk to your principal before leaving."
"Oh okay." I say before rushing back in towards the main office.
It's Sunday in the middle of spring break. There is nobody here other than miss Sydney I guess, yet I can hear loud voices all the way to the hallway. I quietly get closer and recognize the voices yelling.
"Well what did you want me to do Sydney? She didn't want to listen to anything." Dad?
"I don't know Carter. If I knew her any better I would know what to do but I don't! And that's thanks to you." Miss Sydney?
"Don't start with that bullshit again, I had nothing to do with it I already told you."
"You, your parents, same thing."
What the heck it's going on? Why is my dad and my principal yelling at each other? How does miss Sydney know my grandparents?
Without thinking twice I open the door to the office and both of their heads turn to me. I stand in the doorway not being sure of what to say, miss Sydney gives me a shy smile and my dads rubs his forehead.
"What's going on?" I ask and they look at each other. "Dad?" I add. "What's going on here? Why are you shouting at the principal?"
"Here honey take a seat." My dad says taking me to a chair and he sits next to me. Miss Sydney is on the other side of the desk. I don't understand what's going on, are those tears in miss Sydney's eyes?
"Kendra, there's something I need to tell you. It's something very delicate but important." He says and grabs my hands. "Earlier I wanted to talk to you about it but you didn't want to listen to me, it's about your mother." He says and I roll my eyes.
"Dad not again." I say standing up.
"Kendra, I think you should listen to your father." Miss Sydney says, and even though I don't know why is she giving opinions on a personal topic, I respect her too much to say something back, so I just sit down again.
"Kendra, all of your life has always been just me and you, against the world. There is nothing i wouldn't do to see you happy, to see you do good. But you need to know that you also have another parent."
"I don't, I only have you. And I only need you." I say cutting him off.
"Kendra," Miss Sydney says in a very low voice. "Your dad is right, you have a mother. A mother who cares for you, who loves you, who misses you. A mother that hasn't been able to be with you, but has never forgotten about you."
I chuckle. "I'm sorry miss Sydney, but you have no idea of what you're taking about. I don't have a mother. There's only the woman who gave birth to me and then abandoned me and my dad."
"Im sure that's not true Kendra."
"And how would you know?" I ask.
Miss Sydney takes a big breath before saying a couple of words that leave me cold. "Because I am your mother."
What did she say? She has to be lying? There's just no way. Her eyes can't hold the tears anymore and they roll down her cheeks. I turn to my dad who has his head down and his eyes set of the floor. Why isn't he looking at me? I'm still trying to process her words and I feel my eyes get watery.
"What? No, no, this has to be a joke." I say trying to understand what's going on. "Dad? Say something? Dad!" I insist.
My dad finally looks at me, with his blue eyes full of tears as well. "It's true what Sydney said Kenny, she is your mum."
"No, no," I say standing up. "This can't be true, i don't have a mum." Miss Sydney is my mum, Miss Sydney is my mum. The words keep repeating in my head.
"Yes you do Kendra, you are my daughter and I am your mom," she cries. "and i want to get to know you." Miss Sydney adds standing up trying to reach me but I step back.
"No! you don't get to come in to my life 18 years later and expect me to call you or treat you as my mum, when you abandoned us years ago." I feel anger rising inside me, I could even possibly feel smoke coming out of my ears. The audacity of this lady.
"Sweetie that is not what happened, I-"
"That's not what happened?" I chuckle. "I'll tell you what happened. You left. You left me as a baby, you weren't there for my first word or my first steps, you weren't there when my first tooth fell or when i fell sick. You weren't there when I had my first heartbreak. You don't get to come now and claim you have a daughter because you don't." I manage to say in between this sobbing.
Miss Sydney is now crying as well and my dad is standing next to me without even saying a word. He knows what he did therefore he is not able to face me.
"And you dad? You're not going to say anything? She left us, both of us." I cry, i then realize he knew who she was but didn't say anything. "You knew all this time who she was and didn't tell me."
"I tried to but you didn't let me. You said you didn't want to know anything about her."
"Carter!" Miss Sydney snaps at my dad.
"I'm sorry Sydney but it's true. Honey, I swear to you I didn't know she was the school's principal. I just found out when I came here on Thursday."
"You know what, you're right," I say to my dad. "I don't care. I didn't care, before, I don't care now." I say making my way out of the office.
"Kendra wait," Miss Sydney says and I stop. "Please listen to me, I have to tell you the truth of why i left-"
"Do you have an idea how many 'truths' I've heard? Every time the story is different. You can be certain I am not interested in listening to you." I last say before exciting the office.
I ran towards my room, with the tears falling down non stop. When I reach my door, I run inside and close the door so fast making a loud noise. Nyla comes out of the restroom in a hurry, I'm sure she got scared with the noise.
"Kendra?" She looks at me worried. "What's wrong?" She asks and I look at her. I let a loud cry out and feel my knees weakling. I let myself go down and Nyla hold her arms out to catch me before I slam myself on the floor.
"Goddammit Kendra what happened? Talk to me girl what happened to you?" She says as she holds me and I cry on her shoulder.
"Why Nyla? Why does this happen to me? Why does everyone lie to me? Why can't I have something good in my life? Something real?" I cry. "I'm surrounded by nothing but lies and I hate it."
"Come on, Kendra help me get you up. Let's go to bed, come on." Nyla says getting me up. I push myself up and walk towards my bed that is next to us. I lay down and Nyla lays down with me and plays with my hair as I cry. She doesn't say anything and doesn't insist on me talking, she just holds me assuring me everything will be okay, I will be okay.
A/N: I apologize for taking so long to update but I recently developed an obsession for Turkish drama and I've been binge watching some series lol I hope you enjoy ❤️